Reuters: Man Lives to Tell of Florida 'Shoot First' Horror

[caseymoz]

11. I'm not a lawyer, but that's my reading of it.

The main part of the statute does give a lot of stipulations on what constitutes self-defense, here it is:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=448082

However, it looks to me like Zimmerman is either extremely lucky or knew exactly what he had to do to follow the letter of the law, and he executed well enough to gum up any prosecution. I mean, he called 911 and expressed the fact that he felt threatened. You can't prove that Zimmerman was involved in any illegal activity when this started. If he struggled with Martin on a neighbor's property, Martin was in a place he shouldn't have been. (Then again, neither should Zimmerman, but he's alive to tell his side of the story while Martin isn't). Instead of, say, shooting Martin in the back, he grappled with him first, and probably let him "win" (Martin was only half his weight and 3/4 of his size) so he could then say he feared for his life when he shot the kid.

I don't know if it went like that, but I presume Zimmerman, who was apparently obsessed with guns and policing, knew about this law, and might have thought through exactly what he would do in a situation like this.

If I'm wrong, why the hell haven't they arrested the guy yet, and why are they having such trouble with it? I mean look at what's happened so far:

Remember a week ago when the Sanford Police Chief resigned temporarily, coupled with that story was a detail that the Seminole County State Attorney Norman Wolfinger had withdrawn from the case. Here is the reason he gave:

“In the interest of the public safety of the citizens of Seminole County and to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest, I would respectfully request the executive assignment of another state attorney for the investigation and any prosecution arising from the circumstances surrounding the death of Trayvon Martin. This request is being made in light of the public good with the intent of toning down the rhetoric and preserving the integrity of this investigation.”

Usually when an attorney withdraws from the case, you get a more specific explanation. If I were suspicious, I'd say he took one look at this case and shrank away in terror, not wanting to have his name and reputation near it.

They then for a few days talked about bringing it to a Grand Jury, but nothing came of that. Then governor Rick Scott talked about getting a special prosecutor. Now, have you ever heard of a criminal case outside of government that required a special prosecutor? I've never heard of it being proposed on a homicide case.

Now Scott's appointed a task force led by the Lt. Governor. When was the last major homicide that required a task force to look into it? They didn't do this with OJ. Why would you appoint, of anyone, the Lt. Governor to be in charge of it? No part of this seems to resemble a routine criminal matter.

Here's what I think is going to happen: the task force is going to waste time and look busy until after the election, which is when they'll announce that they can't bring the case. They have no way of getting around this law. For the Repubs and the Gun-Righters, this is a major scandal, and they were warned by Prosecutors and Police Chiefs that things like this would happen if they passed SYG.

My conclusion: Martin's family has no legal recourse on this-- at all. They are screwed. Race doesn't have much to do with this, either. It's the stupid SYG law. It doesn't matter if we get millions of signatures, if we march, protest, flood the governors office with calls, or even riot. They cannot convict Zimmerman, the most likely can't try him, and there's a good chance they can't even arrest for anything other than a minor felony.

My sympathies to Trayvon Martin's mother.